


your sun, it can shine on me

by owlinaminor



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Established Relationship, F/F, Female Tendou, Female Ushijima, Running, Snow, Winter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-27
Updated: 2016-01-27
Packaged: 2018-05-16 15:25:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5830816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/owlinaminor/pseuds/owlinaminor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The sun grins down at her, Wakatoshi grins next to her, the streets are quiet quiet quiet but full of people and Satori thinks maybe she could keep shedding layers, keep stripping off skin and worries and expectations until she’s nothing more than a beam of sunlight, dancing across the bright blue sky.</p>
            </blockquote>





	your sun, it can shine on me

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [你的太阳，也会照耀我](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10930293) by [Definro](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Definro/pseuds/Definro)



> this is a self-indulgent fic i wrote as a birthday present to myself, because i'm a nineteen-year-old adult and this is how i choose to live my life. it's quickly written and unbeta'd, so all mistakes are my own. it's also no longer my birthday (the actual Anniversary Of My Birth was the 25th), but as i said, this is how i choose to live my life.
> 
> i should note that i headcanon ushiten as qpps (because i headcanon ushijima as ace-spectrum demiromantic and tendou as at the crossroads between pan and aro/ace.) those concepts aren't a huge part of this fic, but that _is_ the reason i refer to ushijima as tendou's partner, not her girlfriend.
> 
> title is from jason mraz's [sunshine song](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMAFAqOxyOc), because, well, i did say this was self-indulgent.

The bed is getting cold.

For no good reason, Satori thinks – she has a perfectly warm comforter, several blankets, fleece sheets, and a personal space heater who, despite her national status as a wing spiker, really should be winning awards for her cuddling capabilities.  But right now, at – she checks the clock, 6:42 A.M., God, it’s _6:42 A.M._ – there’s a 190-centimeter-long freezing-cold expanse of sheet with no person on top.

Satori rolls over onto her back and, after a moment of gathering willpower, pushes her copper-red hair out of her face.  (She really needs to get a haircut.)  Sunlight is starting to peek in through the blinds, but for the most part, the bedroom is cloaked in soft gray.  Satori blinks at the dresser, the lamp in the corner, the clothes strewn across the floor, the posters on the walls before she catches sight of a shadow moving about on the far side of the room, pulling on sweatpants.

“Toshi,” Satori mumbles.

The shadow takes a step forward, reaching behind her head to pull her hair into a short ponytail.  She’s just wearing a sports bra and sweatpants, somehow not cold in the chilly morning, and between the tight muscle just visible in the half-light and the tiny smile winking across her face as she looks at Satori, the comment Satori was going to make slips completely out of her mind.

“Good morning,” Wakatoshi says.

Satori groans and flops onto her side.  The bed is so cold.  It really shouldn’t be this cold.  Oh – she was going to chastise Wakatoshi for leaving her without a space heater.  That’s what she was going to say.

But before she can string enough words together to form a coherent sentence, Wakatoshi continues.  “I’m going for a run.  I’ll be back in half an hour.  Forty-five minutes, maybe.”

A _run_?!

With incredible effort, possibly equal to that required to understand calculus or guess what Wakatoshi is thinking at any given moment not on the volleyball court, Satori raises herself up on her elbow to stare at her partner.

“Do you know how cold it is outside?”

“Minus seven degrees Celsius.  I just checked the weather.”  Wakatoshi pulls a tank top over her head, and Satori privately mourns the lost view.  Well, at least she still has a clear line of sight to the arms that hit a thousand un-receivable spikes.

“That’s _freezing_!” Satori exclaims.  She’s cold now, with multiple blankets on – she can’t imagine what the outside world must be like, with its wind and ice and lack of central heating.

“Below freezing, actually,” Wakatoshi corrects.  She pulls on a long-sleeved shirt – and there go the biceps.  What a tragedy.

“But it snowed yesterday!  Like, almost a meter!”

“Sixty-eight centimeters.”

Satori is practically sitting up now, attempting to maintain eye contact with Wakatoshi as she rummages through one of their dresser drawers for a clean pair of socks.  “You mixed up the warm socks with the sports socks again,” she says.

But Satori isn’t listening.  “They probably haven’t cleared the streets yet!  There’s gonna be snow and ice _everywhere_!”

“I suppose so.  It will be a nice challenge.”  Wakatoshi pulls on her socks standing up, balancing easily on one leg at a time.  It’s a simple talent, but one Satori has always envied – she can’t stand on one leg for more than a few seconds without toppling over.

“If – if you slip and fall in the ice and break something, who’s gonna make dinner, Wakatoshi-kun?” Satori asks.  “Who’s gonna water your plants?  Who’s gonna get me the good chocolate off the top of the cabinet?  I’d have to try to get it, and then _I’d_ fall, and then _I’d_ break something, and where would we be then, huh?  _Where would we be then?_ ”

Wakatoshi grabs her jacket and heads out of the bedroom.

“We’d be fucked, is where we’d be!” Satori shouts.

There’s no response.

Satori turns onto her back and stretches for a moment, lifting her leg up until she feels her muscles stretch, thighs burning like the midday sun.  The plaster ceiling is mocking her, and the bed, with all its blankets and close vicinity to central heating, doesn’t quite hold the same appeal it did before.

She sighs, jumps up, and starts looking for her sweatpants.

* * *

It’s sunny outside.

It’s funny how it’s always so sunny the day after a storm, Satori thinks.  Like the weather is inviting you to come outside and marvel at how different everything is, like a little kid who painted all over the kitchen walls and pulls her mother in by the hand to commend her on her masterpiece.

The city streets are coated in silver and white, hiding mailboxes and sidewalks and rooftops.  Frost etches patterns onto glass windowpanes, ice hanging down from the sills in tendrils.  The stink of city air – that concoction of car exhaust, garbage, and urine – is muted, masked by a strange blankness, as though the whole block has been washed clean.  And, more than anything else, the city is quiet.  No screeching sirens, no blaring horns – just a few faraway shouts, and what Satori hopes is a dog barking.

Satori lets out a long exhale and watches her breath float up into the clear blue sky for a second, then clatters down the steps of the apartment building.

Wakatoshi is waiting at the bottom of the stairs, as Satori knew she would be.  When she sees Satori, she straightens up from where she was stretching against the railing and starts to jog.

Satori matches her stride easily.

“You know, you really should stretch beforehand,” Wakatoshi says.

Satori leaps over a pile of snow, whooping as she lands on a clear patch of sidewalk.

Wakatoshi starts running faster.

* * *

Satori wasn’t wrong, exactly.

First, it’s definitely cold.  Despite the bright sun, it’s so cold, Satori can feel her legs going numb after the first couple of blocks.  She catches a glimpse of her reflection in a store window and sees a red cheeks and nose – almost as bright as her hair.  When she spits into the gutter, clearing out her throat, the spit freezes the second it hits metal.

And second, the sidewalk is almost certainly much too hazardous to run on.  Where there isn’t ice, there’s snow, and where there isn’t snow, there’s slush, pushed into piles by trucks and shovels and impatient boots.  Running from block to block is a constant struggle of jumping up, going around, trying desperately not to slip and fall.

Satori wasn’t wrong – but at the same time, she was incredibly wrong.  She had never expected the people.

Because there are people,  _people_  outside at seven-thirty in the morning the day after a snowstorm.  Not just crazy people like Wakatoshi, but normal people.  Businessmen and businesswomen in their businesscoats and businesssuits heading to work, pausing their urgent phone conversations to gasp as Wakatoshi and Satori run by.  Old couples bundled up in so many coats, their faces are barely visible, trundling carefully across intersections.  Other joggers, stony-faced and determined, giving Wakatoshi and Satori a nod that Satori returns with at least triple the enthusiasm.  Preteen guys tossing a ball around on the sidewalk – Satori catches it, tells one of the kids to go long, then hurls It right at him.

They nearly trip over a group of kids having a snowball fight – and immediately get plastered with surprisingly well-aimed snowballs as a result, the kids’ colorful snowsuits dancing in time with their laughter.  Satori takes the interaction as an excuse to put together a couple of snowballs herself and chuck them at Wakatoshi’s receding back.  (Wakatoshi always did keep a steady pace - easy to aim at.)

A few moments later, Satori glances up ahead to find that her partner has completely disappeared.  She starts to slow down, wonders if Wakatoshi might’ve slipped somehow and not said anything –

And then, an enormous snowball hits her right in the ass.

Satori spins around so fast, she nearly knocks into a stop sign – and sees Wakatoshi standing in a side street, laughing at her.  She tries to be mad, but it’s hard.  It's so hard.

And the best part – the best part, the absolute _best part_ is all the dogs. There are big dogs and little dogs, colorful dogs and dressed-up dogs, meandering dogs and straining at the leash dogs.  Satori tries to stop to say hello to every single one, telling the dogs how good they are at being dogs and asking them what they think of all the new snow and if they’ve sniffed any particularly great butts recently while their owners look on in somewhat confused benevolence.

Satori usually gets behind when she stops for the dogs, but it’s not much of a problem.  She just thinks about how this could be some dog’s first snow storm for a few minutes – that gives her enough energy to catch up.

At one point, a few minutes after they turn around, Satori spots a dog in front of her, and a Wakatoshi kneeling next to it.  The dog is a puppy, a tiny black lab, trying to swim through a massive snowbank – and Wakatoshi is crouched beside it, encouraging it with soft words and soft smiles.

Satori stops a few meters behind them and watches, the grin on her face so wide, she thinks her cheeks might break open.

So, yeah, it’s cold outside.  Minus seven degrees Celsius, cold enough that Satori’s sweat might freeze on the back of her neck if she isn’t careful.

But after blocks and blocks – after icy patches dodged and lights sprinted through – after dogs petted and people smiled at – Satori starts to feel warm.  She sheds layers – first a jacket, then a hat – a sweatshirt, a shirt, a pair of gloves – until she knows, intellectually, that taking anything else off would be borderline dangerous – but.

But.  The sun grins down at her, Wakatoshi grins next to her, the streets are quiet quiet quiet but full of people and Satori thinks maybe she could keep shedding layers, keep stripping off skin and worries and expectations until she’s nothing more than a beam of sunlight, dancing across the bright blue sky.

* * *

“So, what did you say about it being too cold and icy to run?”

Satori turns her head to look at her partner – Wakatoshi is sprawled on her back in the snow next to Satori, arms folded behind her head.  Both of them are wearing only one long-sleeved shirt and the tank tops underneath with their sweatpants now, outer layers tossed about haphazardly like volleyballs on a gym floor after a long practice.

“Okay, to be fair,” Satori says, “at least seven anime characters have died of blizzards or cold exposure in the past year alone.”

Wakatoshi shakes her head.  There’s a beat – a silence, leaving Satori to wonder if she should think of a follow-up excuse –

And then Wakatoshi is rolling on top of her, shoving a huge ball of snow in her face.

“What the – you – you shitty –” Satori exclaims.  She tries to wipe her face with her sleeve, but Wakatoshi soon has that arm pinned – Satori twists out of the hold, tries to grab a handful of snow for retaliation – and then, somehow, they’re rolling around like a couple of kids, no conception of pneumonia or taxes or anything less than _here_ and _now_ and _what the fuck is she really going to shove ice down my shirt how dare she I love this shirt._

Several soaked clothing items and two distinct body temperature decreases later finds Satori on her back again, breathing hard.  The street is quiet, quiet enough that all she can hear is her breathing and Wakatoshi’s, moving in and out together.

“Thank you for running with me,” Wakatoshi says – sincere as she always is, brown eyes deep and warm and soft around the edges.

“Anyti –” Satori replies – half word, half undignified shriek as Wakatoshi moves closer, pressing ice-cold kisses to her collarbone.

“That’s _freezing,_ you’re freezing, you’re.”  Satori trails off.  Collects her thoughts.  Five years ago, maybe, she would’ve lost any ability to form thoughts at all, would’ve let herself be carried on a wave of heat until she forgot where she was what she was who she was – but she’s different, now.  She’s built up a tolerance.  And she may be less smooth, less elegant than Wakatoshi, but she’s got strategies of her own.

Satori kicks up with both legs, locks her ankles around Wakatoshi’s waist, then drags her in by the collar for the kind of deep open-mouthed kiss that leaves both of them breathless and grinning.

“You.  You checked that nobody was nearby before you did that, right?” Wakatoshi asks.  (And Satori tries not to be incredibly proud of how long it takes her partner to reach the end of her sentence.)

Satori shakes her head.  “But does it matter, really?”

Wakatoshi looks at Satori – considers her, like she’s considering a volleyball play, or a carefully worded speech, or the rest of her life.

“I suppose not,” she says.

“Thought so.”  Satori gives her partner a shove.  “Now get off – you owe me a shower.  A long one.”

**Author's Note:**

> talk ushiten to me on [tumblr](http://officialyachihitoka.tumblr.com/)


End file.
